Leg 4: 397 miles from Badlands to Oberlin, KS
(2,449 miles so far)
A strong blow began the day before I left the Badlands. It whirred across my ears all afternoon, blew dust and gravel into my eyes, and bowed my tent downward most of the night. I slept on the windward side to keep the stakes from getting pulled up out of the ground. It was strong and sustained enough to be a conversation topic among locals at the filling station the next morning. It continued the next day and blew the car around as I headed south on undulating SD 73 toward Nebraska. Amber waves of grain were more of a grassland maelstrom. And millions of sunflowers, all facing eastward and reminding me of weary, regimented soldiers more than future lipids (this is big sunflower oil cropland) were holding up, but just barely. But then again, maybe soldiers and sunflowers all wind up becoming grist for the mill in some fashion.
Even with the wind, the noonday sun brought huge numbers of grasshoppers out to warm themselves on asphalt of this sleepy state road. Let me tell you, these were some mongo-sized jiminies. Fist-sized, maybe! It was impossible not to hit them. At least that’s what I told myself after the first dozen. They make this god-awful sound when they get kicked up under your floorboards like stones. And then there are the ones that scramble side to side as you approach. Do you steer gently with them to try to keep them between the wheels as you pass over at 65 mph? That’s what I tried to do until I realized the tractor-trailer coming at me in the other lane would—in my quick, self-serving karmic calculation—do more harm. And this wasn’t my car to fuck up.
At the border, SD 73 turns into Nebraska 61. A few miles on is the nearly abandoned town of Merriman. And then it’s 67 miles until you get to Hyannis. Not a café or gas station or phone booth in between. Every 10 or 15 miles through these rolling hills you’d pass a lonely ranch gate. But these just led to rutted roads that disappeared over the horizon. No buildings. No silos. No barns. Nothing. Ranches halfway down this stretch need to go 35 miles in either direction to do ANYTHING. I only passed 5 vehicles going north in 67 miles, three of them in the last 5 miles before Hyannis.
Nothing but the simple stuff here along NE 2.At Hyannis, I turned east onto scenic NE 2. This is a road I was on, going west, 12 years before, nearly to the day I suspect, on my first cross country road trip. One of the best parts is the active rail line it parallels that is basically a highway for coal. Every half hour or so, a 100-car unit train of coal from the Powder River Basin in Wyoming—one of the largest sources of coal in the world—lumbers eastward toward power plants in the Midwest and Southeast US. Today was so windy that as I was pacing one train (54 mph) I noticed what looked like smoke blowing off of the tops of the open-hopper cars. It took me a minute to realize it was actually coal dust. Lots and lots of it. Glad I don’t live beside these tracks.
For much of this trip, I’ve been listening The Omnivore’s Dilemma on CD. It happened to be in the glove box and I’ve been thankful for it through some of the long stretches of highway. It’s been oddly like a narrative for the entire trip so far. I began listening in Iowa when the earlier chapters focused on an Iowa corn grower. I heard more while in South Dakota as I was being introduced to Pollan’s calf on a ranch in Sturgis, SD. Eventually, I wound up in Kansas about 50 miles from the feedlot that his calf wound up on and I kept passing transporter trucks for that feedlot operation—Poky—on all the roads I was on. I started to think of The Truman Show.
So Kansas was another of the states I haven’t been to yet and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t totally giddy when I passed over the border. Of the three (SD, KS and OK) this is the state I really, really wanted to visit.
I pulled into Oberlin, KS, after most of the shops closed up for the night. And the downtown was pretty much deserted, save for a few cars in front of the local watering hole. Its Main Street is a period piece from the late 1800s with some 1950s storefronts mixed in. It has the requisite covered sidewalks that I really love. There are competing local drug stores directly across the street from each other and I wondered if there was a Hatfield-McCoy sort of feud going on. (And, if so, which one was the real McCoy.) I pulled in here because I had seen a sign for the Landmark Inn on the highway about 30 miles north. I hoped that it wasn’t going to be too dear because the thought of staying here for the night really appealed to me. And given the quiet, lonely state of affairs, I couldn’t see how it could be anything but a bargain. More importantly, I wanted to support this town with some economic activity.
The Landmark Inn is the old Oberlin Savings Bank. The old bank lobby is now the Teller’s Room Restaurant. The sign on the door said dinner was served from 6-8pm, but at 7:15 it was bolted tight. There wasn’t a single car parked in front except for my own. I wandered around the corner looking for a way into the hotel proper. Finally I found a door along the side street that opened into a small hallway across from an empty room that said Managers Office. I called a hello. Not a soul. At the end of the hallway was the back entrance to the restaurant as well as the adjoining gift shop. Both doors ajar but each area dark. Both areas were outfitted with dozens of antique fixtures in a potpourri of styles. Someone, clearly, was trying to curate this space. And it was spotless. I did note that everything I saw was on offer, each having a small handwritten price tag visible.
I made my way back to the office and hollered once more.
Finally, as I was getting ready to leave, the proprietor walks down the stairs in his socks and seemed a little surprised to see me. I suddenly wondered what he did with the bodies and their vehicles. Nevertheless, we exchanged pleasantries and handshakes and I asked how much for a room.
He cleared off a pile of books and paper from the chair in his cramped office and hit a few keys on the computer, toggling through screens which he scrutinized through squinted eyes like he was poring over an ancient ledger.
“Looks like we have one of our basic rooms—queen sized bed.”
In a place that couldn’t have had more than 5 or 6 rooms, all of which were perfectly empty, I couldn’t quite imagine what he needed to consult the computer for. He stared at his screen while tapping some more keys and said more slowly, as if a premonition where slowly coming into focus, “Also… looks like we have… a slightly… larger one for… a little more.”
Just as he was making his way into the third option, I decided to put an end to the little charade and asked him how much the basic room was.
“$69.00”
I suddenly felt less like I was sharing the wealth with this sleepy little town than I was being had. But I was tired and desperately needed a shower after 3 days of camping and so I signed on the dotted line. Upstairs, for my 69 bucks was one of the handsomest rooms I’ve stayed in. High ceilings with ceiling fans. Ten-foot windows with draw shades. A four-poster bed. Antique washstand. Not half bad.
And I was even more surprised when, at breakfast the next day in the famed Teller’s Room, there were indeed 4 or 5 other guests. From where they materialized overnight, I have no idea. But they were there and all knew the proprietor well and we all got on just fine as I shared my Kansas itinerary for the day and got earnest pointers from everyone.
Yes, I thought. Definitely Truman Show.
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